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Teru Talk News

Teru Talk Newsletter

Volume II, Issue 11, March 12, 2012 
Teru Talk by Michael Theroux (pronounced "Terú")  

Teru's Trash Talk

For conversion technology (CT) development and implementation, it seems we may finally be getting into the "put up or shut up" phase. Globally, we are seeing everybody from the smallest communities to massive international conglomerates deciding to give CTs a chance. Teru's favorite this week: New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg says it's time to see if non-incineration Waste Conversion can actually be accomplished cleanly and safely to increase the City's landfill diversion, in addition to and integrated with all the City's other waste management and recycling activities. On the other side of the country, Washington's Governor Gregoire signed some common sense biomass and waste conversion methods into law, nixing silly old exclusions in an effort to increase renewables and bolster the struggling forest-based economy. The new law is bound to instigate a burst of project activity. And Oregon is well into its own CT assessment, holding its second key advisory meeting to figure the Who, What, Where, and How Much of waste conversion.

 

It is a puzzlement to me to still hear apparently bright people claim we can't cleanly recover valuable electricity, fuels and chemicals from the mountains of urban, agricultural and forest wastes we constantly pay to throw away. The usual drone, especially with the Military's exploration of waste-to-biofuels right now is that the first few dribbles cost way too much. Well, duh. How much was a flat screen TV, oh, say about five years ago? Shall we look to standard pricing practice for pharmaceuticals? Cell phones, computers, or CTs: come on, folks, we know the drill. We make it the hard way, we get it out there and allow the Market to sort out the winners, and the prices drop as numbers go up. Except perhaps with Eastern Oil and other monopoly commodities … but then, that sort of false-value market control is a lot of the impetus for this whole waste utilization push, isn't it?

Hey Rube!

As the governments of our globe put out the Requests, our industry needs to stand to, fill out the forms and file the proposals. Yes, these are costly and difficult, but nobody said this would be simple or cheap. Yet take a good look at the new ARPA-E notice: for THAT, the first step is to send in a simple concept, to say, well yes I DO have an idea, and I'm ready to get to work.

The Week's Extra Reading

We had a bad link in the newsletter last week for Teru's new article describing the New Forest Planning Rule and Access to Woody Biomass. If you wanted to read it but couldn't connect, please try again, and accept our apologies.

The Week's News

Air Liquide Purchases Georecover Renewable Landfill Gas Assets

Air Liquide Advanced Technologies U.S. LLC announced that it has acquired the landfill gas collection and processing assets of the company Georecover - Live Oak LLC, including the company's gas processing facility in Conley, Georgia. 03/11/2012

 

GreenWatt Raises EUR 6 MM in Investment Round to Fund International Growth

Innogy Venture Capital and SRIW joined the European investment group Gimv-Agri+ and existing investors Energie Brabant Wallon, Nivelinvest, Vives and business angels to invest EUR 6 million in GreenWatt S.A. 03/11/2012

 

Washington State Governor Signs Legacy Biomass Facility Bill

The Washington Forest Protection Association (WFPA) has announced that Governor Chris Gregoire has signed Senate Bill 5575 into law to "put common sense back into the system by allowing facilities that can produce renewable energy and organic material to count." 03/11/2012

 

Pepco Contracts with DC Water for $170MM Turnkey Biogas to CHP Plant

Headquartered in Virginia, Pepco Holdings subsidiary Pepco Energy Services Inc. has announced that it has signed an agreement with the District of Columbia Water and Sewer Authority (DC Water) to design, build and operate a combined heat and power (CHP) plant fueled by biogas from the agency's Blue Plains Advanced Wastewater Treatment Plant (AWTP). 03/09/2012

 

CalRecycle Schedules 3rd Regulatory Cleanup Workshop: Compostable Materials   CalRecycle has announced the next stage of review for regulatory clean-up of Title 14 and Title 27, scheduling the 3rd informal Workshop for March 27, 2012. 03/08/2012

 

Alphabet Energy Secures Additional $2MM to Advance Waste Heat Recovery

San Francisco area based Alphabet Energy has announced it has now secured an additional $2 million in strategic capital from Hercules Technologies Growth Capital, following on last quarter's Series A round support of $12 million, led by TPG Biotech. 03/08/2012

 

New Special Economic Zone in Cayman Islands Seeks High-Tech Companies

The government of the Cayman Islands has announced launch of Cayman Enterprise City (CEC) as the first Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in the Caribbean. 03/08/2012

 

Metso to Build Bio-Oil Demonstration Plant for Fortum Power in Finland

Global technology supplier Metso Corporation has announced signing of an agreement with Fortum Power to build a bio-oil production facility in Joensuu, Finland. 03/08/2012

 

Virdia Has New Name, Closes $30M, Plans Expansion to Mississippi

California-based biofuels company HCL CleanTech has changed its name to Virdia and has announced that it has closed on over $30 million in its recent funding round. 03/07/2012

 

SNV Completes Feasibility Studies for Biodigesters in Peru and Bolivia

The Netherlands-based philanthropic organization SNV reports on results of recently completed feasibilities studies for development of national programs in Peru and Bolivia to establish rural biodigesters. 03/07/2012

 

ALL Power Labs to hold Gasification PowerExchange Workshop

ALL Power Labs (APL) has announced a three-day Gasification PowerExchange Workshop #11 to be conducted March 30, 31 and April 1, 2012 in its Berkeley headquarters and production factory. 03/06/2012

 

Itochu Invests in ZeaChem for 2nd Generation BioEthanol Technology

Japan's Itochu Corporation has announced acquisition of shares in advanced biochemical and biofuel specialist ZeaChem, Inc to further commercialize the Colorado-based company's hybrid microbial / thermal technology platform. 03/06/2012

 

Hamworthy Secures Contract for Biogas Liquifaction Plant with Cambi

Cambi AS has contracted with Hamworthy Oil & Gas Systems for biogas handling and liquefaction at the food waste to biogas plant under construction in Nes, Romerike near Oslo, Norway. 03/06/2012

 

Bingaman's Clean Energy Standard Act of 2012 Includes Waste-to-Energy

Senator Bingaman (D-NM) introduced the Clean Energy Standard (CES) Act of 2012 (S. 2146) on March 1, 2012, an energy policy priority for President Obama, but without bi-partisan support in the Senate. 03/05/2012

 

GESI Selects InREFco Gasification for Railroad Tie Conversion to Energy Project

Green Energy Solution Industries, Inc (GESI) has announced selection of a thermal technology for conversion of waste to electricity or commodity biofuels, entering into a Letter of Intent with International Renewable Energy Facilitation Company (InREFco) for the provision of a starved-air gasification platform. 03/05/2012

 

Winners Announced in 2nd Annual Clean Energy Challenge

The Clean Energy Trust (CET) has announced selection and awards for its 2nd annual Clean Energy Challenge launched last September. I 03/05/2012

 

Oregon DEQ Plans 2nd Advisory Meeting for Conversion Technology Rulemaking  The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) has announced a second open meeting on April 12, 2012 for the Advisory Committee selected to assist in the Conversion Technology (CT) Rulemaking process 03/05/2012

 

Correction! CalRecycle's Forum on Digesting Urban Organic Residuals is on May 30, 2012 and not March 30. Many thanks to our astute readers for pointing that out to us.

The Week's Action Items

Due 03/16/2012: Proposals to CPUC for Renewable DG Technical Analysis

The due date for proposals to the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC)for renewable DG technical analysis services has been extended to 3/16/2012. 03/06/2012 Update

 

Due 03/30/2012: LOIs to ARPA-E for Transformational Energy Technologies

The US Department of Energy has announced that the Advanced Research Projects Agency - Energy (ARPA-E)  just released a $150 million Funding Opportunity Announcement (DE-FOA-0000670), seeking proposal submissions on all forms of "transformational energy technologies" that would not otherwise be able to attract private investment, but could lead to breakthrough energy technologies. 03/07/2012

 

Due 06/05/2012: Proposals to NY City for Non-Incineration Waste to Energy

New York City's Mayor Michael Bloomberg has announced that a Request for Proposals (PIN# 82712RR00028) issued by the Department of Sanitation (DSNY) is seeking development of a pilot non-incineration facility for conversion of the City's waste to clean energy. 03/11/2012

 

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Teru Talk is an online publication of JDMT, Inc with the goal of opening the dialogue and providing current news and commentary on issues and successes associated with waste conversion to renewable energy, biofuels and other bio-based products for resource recovery.

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The Teru Talk Newsletter is published weekly or more or less frequently, primarily depending on what is going on in the world of waste conversion or ours.